Birmingham boss Clotet reveals stress at being apart from family

Birmingham manager Pep Clotet admits he is struggling to do his job properly as he deals with the stress of being separated from his family due to the coronavirus.

Clotet sent his wife Vanessa, three-year-old son Max and one-year-old daughter Helena, back home to Spain last week in a bid to keep them safe from the deadly pandemic.

But, within a day of arriving in Igualada, their town was in lockdown because of the virus.

Clotet's father Ramon, 71, and mother Maria, 68 are also in the area near Barcelona and the Birmingham manager is finding it almost impossible to focus fully on his football duties while his family are so far away.

"It is incredibly worrying. I am caught between two worlds. I feel I cannot do my job properly. I keep thinking, 'Maybe I should go back?' But I cannot go back because I am working," Clotet told the Daily Mirror.

"I am so worried. At the moment, everything is OK with the family. We are all still alive.

"In Spain we have been more aware than people were in England. It hit us earlier but it is still on an upward curve.

"But we know what is coming. I don't think people in England do. In Spain they were getting another 2,000 cases a week.

"We felt they were controlling things better in Spain and where we live there is better, so we decided they should go back.

"It was safer so I rushed them to the airport, but as soon as they got to Igualada there was a major outbreak and the police closed it.

"We have a small farm there, as well as a house, so they could be pretty isolated. My parents are locked down in the house and my brother calls every few hours."